Archive for November, 2005

Bush visited Denver, Colorado this week. I was so busy that I did not even learn about this before today, when a Holocaust survivor sent me the attached photo from the protest that, he says, included 800 people for sure. Bush really drives a lot of people in America crazy. Rocky Mountain News said there were 500 anti-war activists present.

ArmeniaNow reports on 25 November 2005, "Beginning from 2007 traffic on Yerevan streets will be monitored by automated systems of video cameras that will come to replace the state automobile agency officers. 214 video cameras and speedometer equipment will be installed at the nine large squares and the streets and crossroads neighboring the squares to register traffic violations."

The cameras will most likely somewhat prevent the corrupted Police of Armenia: "Drivers are expected to greet the cameras as good news, as today’s arbitrary system of fine assessment usually means that drivers are forced to pay $2 to $3 bribes to roadside patrolmen."

"The second stage of changes (for which $2.5 million has been allotted) will come in 2007-8. It provides for installing speedometers on interstate highways and purchasing snowmobiles (presumably for law enforcement in the wintry off-road).

Implementation of the last stage (2009-2010) will call for a $3 million allotment to install traffic control systems in Gyumri, Vanadzor and Echmiadzin. During this period police will also be equipped also with two helicopters."

What ArmeniaNow does not address, is the greed of the Police before the installation of the cameras. Won't they "make up" for the coming years before the cameras are installed?

Puzzling horse skeletons unearthed under the Armenian monastery in the Holy Land

Haaretz reports from Israel on 23 November 2005, "Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologists conducting a salvage dig in the Armenian monastery in Jaffa expected to find artifacts connected to the ancient fortifications of the city. However, a few days ago they were surprised to discover, some 60 centimeters below the monastery floor, no fewer than 10 horse skeletons."

Photo: Archaeologists uncovering the horse skeletons found recently during a salvage dig beneath the Armenian monastery in Jaffa. (Nir Kafri)

The article goes on to say, "The Armenian monastery served at one time as a caravansary for pilgrims. Napoleon Bonaparte quartered plague-infected soldiers here, and when they became a burden he is said to have ordered them shot on the Jaffa beach."

Life News reports on 21 November 2005, "The attorney for convicted assisted suicide crusader Jack Kevorkian has submitted his third request for Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm to pardon or commit his sentence. He says the jailed pathologist is in grave medical shape and should be allowed to end his sentence for killing a disabled man."

The paper goes ahead to remind, "Kevorkian was convicted in April 1999 of killing Thomas Youk, a Detroit-area man with Lou Gehrig's disease whose death was shown on the CBS television show '60 Minutes.' He argued the murder was a euthanasia or mercy killing, but was sentenced for 10 to 25 years in prison."

Dr. Kevorkian, known as Dr. Death, is the son of the survivors of the Armenian genocide. When he was once asked whether he did not feel sorry for "killing" people, he said that he was Armenian, and nobody would understand better what pain and suffering was than him.

Without doubt, Dr. Kevorkian will become a hero in a few years, when finally the American government realizes that assisting suicide is a choice; a tool to prevent human suffering. But, unfortunatelly, he will not learn that he was hero, because he is expected to die shortly.

As Armenia Liberty reports on 22 November 2005, "Israel’s Ashkenazi Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger referred to the 1915-1918 massacres of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey as genocide and prayed for its estimated 1.5 million victims at the end of a two-day visit to Armenia on Tuesday."

“Nobody can feel the pain of the Armenians more deeply than we Jews,” added the Rabbi.

Regnum News Agency quotes the Chief Rabbi saying, “as a representative of the clergy, I do recognize the fact of the genocide, and everything else depends on the political and international relations.”

EuObserver reports on 18 November 2005, "[Turkish Prime Minister] Mr Erdogan walked out on Monday (14 November) over the presence of Danish-based Roj TV, which the Turkish government alleges is financed by the Kurdish rebel group PKK – a group which has been dubbed a terrorist organisation by the EU." The Turkish official has requested to shut down the Kurdish TV and blamed Anders Fogh Rasmussen in supporting terrorism.

AZERI KARATE TEAM BANNED FOR A YEAR AFTER INCIDENT WITH ARMENIAN ATHLETES IN LIMASSOL

Gibrahayer Nicosia 15 November, 2005. After an incident with Armenian athletes, at the opening ceremony of the Fourth World Youth Karate Games that took place at The Palais Des Sport in Limassol, the National Karate Team of Azerbaijan has been banned for a year from participation in all official games of the World Karate Federation, a spokesman of the Cyprus Karate Federation told Gibrahayer today. The World Karate Federation Committee that convened last weekend decided to ban the Azerbaijani Karate Team after one of its athletes provoked and soon after was involved in a scuffle with an Armenian athlete at the opening ceremony in Limassol. The Armenian athlete was rushed to the hospital with a broken tooth. Both teams were not allowed to participate in the opening ceremony. The Armenian and the Azerbaijani teams have left Cyprus after the Games and the official one-year ban to the Azerbaijani National Karate team will be announced within the next couple of days.More than 100 countries participated in the Games.

As Azg reports on 17 November 2005, "On November 14, the first instance court of Belgium took a decision confirming that Emir Kir, state secretary of Brussels Capital Regional Government, is 'a liar, denialist and criminal.'"

Emir Kir, whose name assumes his origin is Turkish, got himself into trouble by starting legal action against "Mehmed Kyoksal and Pierre-Yves Lambert, authors of www.referendum.be website, who called him those names for not having the diploma he assured to have, for participating in an anti-Armenian rally, for denying the Armenian Genocide and falsifying expanses of election campaign."